At an event attended by legal professionals from across the city Simon Goldberg, a senior litigation barrister at Trinity Chambers, welcomed Judge Kramer as the new chancery and business judge.

Mr Goldberg said: “For as long as anyone can remember, whilst business disputes have been dealt with in Newcastle it has been dealt with by a judge from outside the area. We have never had our own judge.

Simon Goldberg, barrister at Trinity Chambers (Image: NCJ Media)

“We have always had to get a judge in from elsewhere and that has acted as a drag on the ability of the court to service work.

“If you know that the judge is full time in London, then it is likely that you will go to London. We have seen a lot of disputes involving Newcastle based businesses go to London or Leeds.”

Judge Kramer’s appointment will benefit many small businesses, who often are not able to stump up the fees needed to pay for expensive legal battles outside of the area. Mr Goldberg added that cheaper legal costs would particularly affect the region’s digital businesses.

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“Newcastle is a hub for tech startups, who don’t have a huge amount of cash at the start,” he said. “They now benefit from Newcastle having a dispute resolution centre as they don’t have the cash to pay for large disputes.”

The legal sector is also expected to gain from the Judge Kramer’s work, as more high profile cases will be retained in the city instead of being sent to London.